Life, one day at a time

R. P. McMurphy

Tuesday 30th May 2017. 8.55pm (day 2,105)

I know it’s a cheat to take photos of a movie screen but I don’t care. This was the major event of my day, a film I have admired for a long time now, and my first chance to see it on the big screen thanks to the BFI reissuing a restored print this year. If you’ve never seen it — go! If you’ve already seen it, well, go and see it again, because you know it’s a brilliant movie. (The book’s a favourite of mine too: as this shot proves.)

I love this scene in particular. Is there any doubt here that Jack Nicholson isn’t ‘acting’…. he has utterly become Randall Patrick McMurphy, he is straining with every sinew and muscle in his body to lift that damn control unit and escape from the institution in which he is incarcerated?